Op-Ed: Tuesday British Home Secretary Theresa May is said to be considering "legal submission demanding [an] inquiry into [the] 1984 confrontation between police and miners during [a] strike"; a confrontation popularly called 'The Battle of Orgreave.

The following report was written June 2015 and offers a background to the case and more information about this now infamous clash between striking miners and police officers of the UK.

The Battle of Orgreave is an infamous episode in the miner's strike of the Thatcher era of British government. In June, 31 years after the clash between police and miners, the IPCC, Independent Police Complaints Commission, announced it would not mount a formal investigation of events. A full report was due to be published.

"The Independent Police Complaints Commission will not mount a formal investigation into allegations of criminal wrongdoing by police even though it has found evidence to suggest that police officers assaulted miners at the mass picket of the Orgreave coking plant during the 1984-85 miners’ strike, then perverted the course of justice and committed perjury in the failed prosecutions which followed."

June 18, 1984, "was the most bitter and infamous of the miners’ strike, with 8,000 pickets seeking to prevent lorries leaving the plant, near Rotherham, met by a 6,000-strong contingent of police drafted in from all over the country."

Such was the determination of Maggie Thatcher's government to crush the miners that money was no object. Police officers received overtime pay to swell the ranks of Northern forces; some were hardened officers who had worked on riot control in Toxteth and Brixton.

Sarah Green, the IPCC’s deputy chair, said Friday that they could not re-wind time. She stressed that if the events had happened more recently an investigation would have been likely but as many police staff and miners involved have moved on, retired or even died it was not possible now.

She said that if new compelling evidence resurfaced that could change. However if it is too late in 2015 how can it be possible at a date in the future?

Nagging doubts about whether today's announcement would have been different if Labour had won the election in May 2015 persist.

The UK has become used to seeing a series of old men dragged through the courts charged with sex offences that date back to the 80's and in some cases earlier.

In January 2014 revelations proved that Mrs Thatcher's Tory government of the 80s lied about the number of UK coal mines they wanted to close and indicated that miner's leader Arthur Scargill was right when he accused her government of having a "secret hit-list" of mines.

The government claimed the figure was 20 but in truth they planned to shut 75 mines over three years.In the UK during the 80's the governing Tory government did its utmost to smash the miner's unions. They succeeded. Vast sums of money were invested to break the miners, who held a protracted strike. Police officers bragged about the amount of money they were raking in to police the often violent protests associated with the strike. This is known first hand. The information was gleaned during the days following the strike from one police officer all too willing to brag that he had bought a new house, car and had an extra vacation, courtesy of the miners.

In other words it was never about money, as far as the UK government was concerned. It was about who wields the power in Britain.The Thatcher government were determined to close mines and shatter miners' unions into tiny useless pieces. They succeeded.Almost 30 years on archived material published Friday [January 2014] confirms what the miner's leader Arthur Scargill always suspected -- that the Tories had their own agenda, which was to close more pits than announced.

Reading Dennis Skinner's autobiography "Sailing Close to the Wind", recently, made for an interesting reading. Mr Skinner, a long-standing Labour MP and former miner, included passages on the Battle of Orgreave.

He vehemently attacks the BBC of the day for showing footage of the running battles between police and miners out of synch.

The result was it appeared to viewers and ultimately voters that the miners were the antagonists when in fact the reverse was true.

In November 2013 BBC News online ran a report which used accounts from both sides of the 'battle'. The first is from a police perspective the second a mining one.

Former police officer John Vipond said the hot day led to cans of drink being given to officers."Just as you heard the click of the cans, the miners kicked off," he said."They started to throw things at us and we had to put these cans down and stand shoulder to shoulder."It became rather nasty after that, with surges back and forward."He said there were "bricks flying and people going down". "One or two bricks were thrown back from the police into their end."

Chris Skidmore was a 22-year-old miner from the Bullcliffe Wood pit in West Yorkshire when he arrived at Orgreave.

Mr Skidmore, who is now the chairman of the NUM's Yorkshire branch, said officers had "pulled some of the miners out of picket"."We could see they weren't just frogmarched off - they were being beaten up. That inflamed the situation."The officers then broke their ranks and the horses charged."It was terrifying having several tonnes of beast galloping at you with a man on top swinging a big stick. Police used horses to charge at the miners during the picket at Orgreave "Everybody was running away looking for shelter."He said he ran to "an ice-cream van, which I tried to get under, but there were already four or five people hiding there who told me to get on my way because there wasn't enough room"."I remember passing one big lad who was eating an ice-cream, and a copper just smashed his nose in with his baton. "He was no threat to anyone."They had cleared the picket and the lorries could get through, so why were they chasing after everyone?"It was ferocious - sheer panic."

The conclusion has to be that decisions as to whether to investigate or not are politically motivated and selective.

Huge sums of money were spent by the government of the day to break the miners' strike. Those arrested feared long jail sentences for rioting.

If the police acted as a rogue force on the day and a corrupt service as they tried to jail some of the miners surely they should be held to account?

In June 2015 ww asked , if not now, when?

December 15, 2015, we ask, why now?

Note: The Orgreave Truth and Justice organisation said in June that the fight goes on and they will push for a public inquiry. They and the NUM hosted an open press conference in the NUM main hall at 2 Huddersfield Road, Barnsley S70 2LS.

It was also said that she broke the law by brining in police from other counties which apparently was not allowed. It was also said that she used army dressed up as police. A great supporter was,again, Murdock with his newspaper The Sun, which people belief it is a people's newspaper but it is not There should be a campaign to stop buying this paper. Murdoch cause trouble then and was causing it now.
Thank you, Eileen, for a good report

Reply

Eileen

12/6/2015 02:09:28 pm

Thanks Hannah

Yes Thatcher and her ministers did the dirty on the miners from start to finish

Reply

Dava Castillo

12/6/2015 01:26:22 pm

Thank you for the report Eileen.

Since this decision was reached by an independent police complaints commission, they must have had some reasons to not proceed. It's a 30 year old case which probably was one of the reasons. It's very difficult to gather admissible evidence and witnesses at this point.

From your description there was wrongdoing, and the mines had a right strike. The best that happen now is for the police to come forward and address changes in policy. In the US we are having a lot of problems with excessive use of force. And historically its always difficult to prosecute the police. As a citizen, I would like to see better policing, which means looking at hiring practices, education and ongoing training.

Reply

eileen

12/6/2015 02:10:50 pm

The wrongdoing by the authorities has been known for some time. Having delayed justice now they say it is too late.

An inquiry has to be the only way forward for the miners now I guess.

Thanks Dava

Reply

Hannah

17/12/2015 11:39:10 pm

But nothing has changed in the Tory Party,. Margaret Thatcher will and legacy still lives on and Cameron excelling himself to carry it on.

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